HIDABITO.jp

An entrance leads us to rich
flavored Japanese sake
with the history of 400 years

HIDABITO 008
Hirase brewery
Mr. Katsuhiro Hirase

“The surface of rice includes vitamins, minerals and protein, and they make sake unfavorable taste. So we need to plane them in order to use only good quality of starch in the middle of rice. The rate how much you cut is called rice-polishing ratio and junmai daiginzyo is made from just 40% of whole rice.”

The 15th president of Hirase brewery Mr. Katsuhiro gave us a lecture of the basic of sake.

He started explaining to us the basic categories of sake and about the building at the entrance.

There is no clear information about the beginning of Hirase brewery, the sake brewery in Takayama city.

hidabito_nonedited_MG_4261

However, a document in Bodaiji-temple has a record of the family register of deaths since 1623, and this means they have been making sake for around 400 years in this area.

The building with glorious beams and impressive blown glasses was built about 100 years ago, in 1915.

Because their old building was burned in a fire, great carpenters in Hida were called to gather and built the new building.

People in a good family started to use a telephone at the time, and you can also see a telephone box left from that period at the side of the dirt floor.

Through the dirt floor, Mr. Hirase guided us into the warehouse used as a storage of fresh sake at first.

The warehouse can stabilize the temperature by its thick mud wall while guarding important sake as their property.

When a fire broke out, people from miso factory came to the warehouse and fill up the gaps in between doors by miso in order to prevent fire.

hidabito_nonedited_MG_4212